


Sherlock is Mycroft's younger brother

by 221bi



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Trans Character, Transgender
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-03
Updated: 2014-06-03
Packaged: 2018-02-03 07:36:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,999
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1736462
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/221bi/pseuds/221bi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A journey of transsexual Sherlock Holmes and John Watson.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sherlock is Mycroft's younger brother

15IX2010  
"What's wrong?"  
"Just met a friend of yours", said John to Sherlock who was lying on the couch. Three nicotine patches on his forearm.  
"A friend", asked Sherlock.  
"An enemy."  
"Oh" responded Sherlock. "Which one?"  
"Your arch enemy... according to him. Do people have arch enemies", asked John.  
"Did he offer you money to spy on me?"  
"Yes."  
"Did you take it?"  
"No."  
"Pity. We could have split the fee. Think it through next time."  
"Who is he?"  
"He's not important."  
"He said something about you being his brother, is that true?"  
"He said that", asked Sherlock. "He did?"  
"Yes", answered John not knowing what the big deal was.  
"Tell me... what did he say exactly?"  
John sighed. "He said your his younger brother and he said..." John paused. "He said his heart would break if something were to happen to you."  
Sherlock exhaled and inhaled deeply. This was John's say that the conversation was over.  
______________________________  
10X2011  
When Sherlock bumped in him on the street he almost didn't recognise her. Him. Him, it's Sherlock, a guy, he almost didn't recognise him.  
Sherlock was wearing a wig that made his face look feminine even more than the make up he was wearing.  
He was also wearing a dress. An actual dress. It was blue with lots of little white flowers on it. John was in awe of how good Sherlock's disguise can be.  
It's not just the wig, the dress, the tights, the way she made her breasts look gorgeous.  
'Wait... what?' John thought. No, it's Sherlock. Sherlock is a bloke. It's probably just make up and a corset.  
"Oh, great, you're here" said Sherlock in a voice that sounded nothing like his usual deep voice. "Apparently the club is female-only so I-"  
"Female-only? So you put on a dress and you're going to try to get in?" John interrupted her. Him. Him, Sherlock's a dude.  
"Yes, why wouldn't I? It's the only way we can find out who killed that woman!" Sherlock was, as always, exited as he got closer to solving another murder.  
John gave up. It's not like he could stop Sherlock from going to that club. She was stubborn. HE was stubborn.

______________________________

31XI2013

"I need some money."  
Sherlock was sitting in his usual chair with his violin in one hand and a pen in the other. He wasn't composing but apparently just holding the instrument helped him thinking.  
"Money for what?" asked John.  
"A surgery" said Sherlock as he got up and took his coat from the hanger by the door.  
And he was gone.  
John decided it was just Sherlock thinking out loud and that he probably didn't even realise John was in the room.  
A minute later he was calling Mycroft.  
"Isn't it my little brother's better half?"  
Mycroft had a weird habit of over-sweeting every sentence when it comes to talking about Sherlock. Plus, he liked mocking them.  
"We're not-... I am not gay!" John was tired and he just wanted to check if Mycroft knew whether Sherlock was in danger or not. "Do you know anything about Sherlock's medical conditions?"  
"I have my sources and I can easily get that information" Mycroft retorted. "Why?"  
"He just got off mumbling about the money he needs to get some sort of surgery."  
"Oh, I see..." Mycroft sounded worried. "Perhaps he-"  
Silence.  
"Perhaps he what?" John insisted.  
"Nothing. You're gonna have to ask him yourself" said Mycroft clearly with his thoughts already somewhere else. "I'll send the necessary money within an hour."  
And that was it. Mycroft hang up.

______________________________

31XI2013

The money was at their doorstep 45 minutes later. But still no sign of Sherlock.  
He and John had lived together for 3 years now and John still hasn't got used to his flatmate's habits.  
John sighed. He opened the package.  
There was a note saying "We're even now. Do call me after it's done. Ps smart move, making John remind me instead of doing so yourself." in Mycroft's clean writing.  
John now has even more questions than answers. 

______________________________

1XII2013

Sherlock got home at about 2 am that night.  
"There's £7000 in the package on your desk" said John. He didn't bother to say "hello". He wasn't mad at Sherlock, he was worried. And he knew Sherlock wouldn't tell him if he asked where he's been all day.  
"You-?"  
"Mycroft" John cut him off.  
Sherlock picked up the package, read the note and opened his computer.  
"You've got questions."  
"Yeah, what surgery?"  
"Top surgery. Probably double incision" announced Sherlock.  
"You wanna elaborate?" commended John.  
"There's nothing to say that you don't already know" sassed Sherlock.  
John looked at him. He was clearly lost.  
"Or maybe there is..."  
"Just... tell me" sighed John. He was tired.  
Sherlock sat down in his usual chair just across from where John was sitting. He seemed sad. And if John hadn't know how much his best friend loved to hear him talk, he'd say Sherlock didn't want to talk about this.  
"John." Sherlock looked John in the eye. "There's something I always meant to say but never did. Since it's unlikely we'll get a better chance I might as well just say it now."  
John didn't want to interrupt so he just listened as Sherlock poured his heart.  
"My birth name is Wilhelma Cheryl Sophie Holmes."

______________________________

1I2014  
John was a little awkward around Sherlock after his surgery. It wasn't due to lack of knowledge in the medical field. It was because he didn't want to offend Sherlock in any way so he wouldn't talk about anything that might have something to do with gender. So he and Sherlock would only talk about weather and food.  
After they took Sherlock's stitches off two weeks after the surgery John went to Lestrade to get Sherlock some light cases. "Light" meaning that Sherlock wouldn't have to run after the murderer or pretend to work in a circus.  
Sherlock looked tired but he also seemed to be happier. He even made a joke the morning after the surgery. He said "Glad to have that off my chest" with a shy smile.

______________________________

2014  
Over the course of the next year Sherlock would slip some personal informations in their conversations.  
"I never thought of myself as a woman" he said one day during breakfast.  
John didn't respond. He never mentioned Sherlock's biological sex. Never talked about it.  
A week later John found a picture of the Holmes siblings on Sherlock's desk. Mycroft was about 18 years old, John figured. Sherlock, or Cheryl, was probably 14. John felt uncomfortable as he looked at a photo of his best friend with long hair, developing breasts and a feminine figure. It wasn't Sherlock. John knew it was Cheryl, who never actually existed.  
"I changed my name and sex marker about a year before we met" explained Sherlock when John found Sherlock's birth certificate.  
John still wouldn't talk about it.  
Sherlock started leaving syringes all over the apartment. John never even mentioned it.  
But when Sherlock left his packer in the bathroom something in John broke.  
"Sherlock!" he yelled. "Next time don't leave your dick in the bathroom, would you?"  
"Are you jealous?" Sherlock retorted.  
John just threw the packer in his flatmate's face.  
"You know? I never talked about it because I don't think there's anything to talk about" stated John. "You're a man, there's no questioning that. And I have no problem with your private parts being that of a woman-" Sherlock cringed at that. "But as the name suggests: your private parts are private."  
Sherlock looked like he wanted to say something but John cut him off again. "Just... make sure it doesn't happen again" he said.  
Sherlock nodded.  
John was already late to his date. Sarah gave him another chance and he's blowing it off by not coming on time.  
"Still, 18 centimetres... impressive" he muttered as he walked out.

______________________________

1XII2014

John heard his name.  
"Yes, Sherlock?" he asked.  
"It's been a year since I came out to you and my therapist-" he said but John interrupted him.  
"You have a therapist?"  
"Yes" Sherlock responded. "And she thinks it would be best if we could discuss everything about my gender identity freely and since you never asked questions I thought I should just get it over with and tell you everything."  
John was quiet.  
Sherlock sighed.  
"As you know" he begun his monologue. "I was born Wilhelma Cheryl Sophie Holmes. I wasn't feminine but I wouldn't say I was any different than other girls my age. Mummy would make me wear dresses and Mycroft would make fun of me and quite frankly that was the only reason I hated dresses." he stopped for a moment and John thought he was organising his memories. "Mycroft and I learnt things at our own speed so my peers would mock me for being interested in anatomy while they were learning numbers. I knew how to count since I was 3."  
Another pause.  
"Other than that... my parents wanted me to go to female secondary school. I was stubborn and finally they let me go to a co-educational school. But then something in me broke. I had all the parts of a female, my breast were, unfortunately, developing, my hair was long, my face feminine. But I wasn't like other girls. So I started wearing dresses, being all girl-y, even bought high heels. I thought that maybe they're all faking it, maybe it's about image and not about who you are inside. But it wasn't it. Three years later, when I was 16 I realised I couldn't do it anymore. I realised I was a boy. I started embracing who I was. Wore buttoned shirts and trousers, cut my hair short."  
John didn't say a word. He didn't dare stop his best friend from telling him all this.  
"But... turns out people don't see you for who you are. They look at your chest and if they see breasts they call you a "she". 'You're a woman now, Cheryl' that's what my mother told me when she decided I need to start wearing bras." Sherlock seemed upset. "So even though you saw a boy when you looked in the mirror, everyone else who looked at you saw a girl."  
Sherlock kept looking directly behind John.  
"I didn't have many friends so I wouldn't say I had much help on my exploration of gender. But the one I did have immediately started using the correct pronouns. They were accepting. Some thought that I was just being silly and that it was a phase but I stopped talking to them, they were toxic and just made my dysphoria even worse."  
"When I came out to my parents and my brother they weren't supportive at all. They refused using the right name and pronouns, they made a lot of transphobic jokes, and told me I was doing this just for attention', Sherlock's voice was steady but John could hear that he was upset. "I got out of there as soon as I could. They helped me, yes, but they never acknowledged my identify. To them I was still Cheryl. So I got an apartment and set up a saving account. My brother came to me when I started HRT and offered to help me with all the paper work but I told him that he'd have to make up for all the damage he'd done in another way. That's what he meant by giving me money for top surgery."  
"I started T when I was 19. As I told you before I finalised the paper work a year before we met" Sherlock added.  
He fell silent for a while. John was wondering whether or not he should say something.  
"And now, thanks to my brother, I had top surgery almost a year ago", finished Sherlock.  
"Well, I'm glad we had that talk", said John after a while.  
"A monologue..." retorted Sherlock.  
"Yes, well, thank you."


End file.
